Tuesday, February 20, 2007

Two days and a bit of reflection

Pearlie went to Kids’ Club on Monday. It was a quiet session as several of the girls weren’t there. Later she went to the grandmothers’ house, where my mum had a new French magazine for her to read.Leo and I went to MMs where there was an auction. This was great fun and the kids did very well to handle disputes over much wanted items. Leo returned laden down with things, so our friends K and G gave us a lift home.Leo went on a somewhat chaotic penny hike with his Woodcraft group in the evening. He was happy because Dani had sewn his badges onto his hoodie. A penny hike is a good thing – you stop at each corner and toss a coin to decide which way to go next. I’m not entirely clear how you get everyone home – but they got back in the end.Pearlie had some trouble sleeping in the evening and was still awake at 12.45am. But she was up before me this morning, and seems to have made it through the day.

Dani went to work today and the rest of us got up slowly. The kids got very busy while still in nightwear. P got a postcard from her pen-friend (the little girl not the US convict) and this prompted her to write a long letter in reply. She did this lying on the floor in the hallway – occasionally calling me to check a spelling. Leo spent some time reading his Wild Times magazines, and then drawing.Both the kids had their Squeezebox sessions in the afternoon. Pearlie enjoyed herself as usual and Leo seems to be doing very well coping with a 30 min lesson. Pearlie’s little band is getting a third member from next week – one of her home ed friends from Kids’ Club.

I have been reflecting recently on how our HE approach is developing. There are ups and downs, of course, but at the moment I am feeling very happy with the way an autonomous approach is panning out. P, in particular, seems to have really cracked the art of being happily productive. Recently she has been enjoying learning a few words of Greek, with which she can be polite when we go to Crete in the summer. She has also set herself a goal with a particular bit of knitting and is putting in the required work to complete it. Leo is enjoying pottering about and learning a lot along the way. He always draws and has recently been enjoying using the drawing programme on the pc. He is also doing a lot of constructing things out of cardboard – so the floor is often covered in little bits of cardboard, tape and pairs of scissors. Both the kids are on the pc every day – sending emails and looking for information.

And we all talk all day long!

Sometimes we decide to do a little bit of finding out together. Last week we made a Mole display on our notice board. This had drawings with captions by Leo, a haiku by Pearlie, pictures of our cuddly moles wearing garments made by Pearlie – and of moles made by me and Leo. We also put up some printouts of info we found on the internet. The kids also found all the story books we had that contained moles – and I read them all aloud. I don’t think we’d be happy trying to work together all the time, but it’s nice every now and then. This evening Pearlie asked if we could get some new big jigsaws to work on together.

I am enjoying reading Eragon to Leo. He has read one chapter of a library book in the Ilmoor Chronicles, but I’m not sure that it has really gripped him. Pearlie is reading a set of books we gave her for Christmas – Terry Deary true tales.

And I keep forgetting to blog that Leo and I made a gorgeous banana cake last week - very gooey.

7 comments:

Penny hike sounds excellent fun. Did you ever see a series called Dice Man about a man who travelled all over the place deciding his next adventure on the throw of a dice. Wonder if there is a book about it?

I only read that a few years ago - very much of its time in some ways I would say, as an early 70s unreconstructed male author's novel but the idea is fun. There's quite a bit of consideration in the book about how you might like to see what you're doing as more random than it is, in that you choose which questions to ask the dice, and how to phrase them, for example.Ali

Yeah, I read the Dice Man years ago - mainly for the sex at the time, lol!

I told the kids about penny hikes the first time I read about the idea here - a scarily long time ago I guess! And we *still* haven't done one, although they do talk about it from time to time. Must do it!

What recipe did you use for the banana cake? The ones I've made have been very variable.